Deep cleans are all the rage as a COVID-19 summer sweeps the country. To some, COVID-19 seems to be a battle in which infections will be eradicated from every square inch of all objects’ surface area by antimicrobial blasting.

COVID-19 has generated misplaced fear, prompting companies and families to worry about risk-reduction routines that  “make us feel safer but don’t actually do much to reduce risk—even as more dangerous activities are still allowed”. This has been dubbed “hygiene theatre” by Derek Thompson of the Atlantic.

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Hygiene theatre is based on a notion proposed by security expert Bruce Schneier in his book ‘Beyond Fear,’ published in 2003. After the 9/11 terror attacks, Schneier introduced the phrase “security theatre” to characterise the security measures adopted at airports, such as the prohibition of nail scissors and cigarette lighters. In truth, these precautions were ineffective: they were more of a sophisticated ruse to calm worried passengers than anything founded in reality. They also came at a significant cost to taxpayers: since 9/11, the US has spent more than $100 billion on aviation security.

COVID-19, according to Schneier, has ushered in a new era of hygiene theatre. “Like security theatre,” he told the Guardian, “hygiene theatre comes from bad risk analysis – really, from ignorance.” This was reasonable during the start of the pandemic, according to Schneier. “Nobody knew anything,” he said. “We were all confused about what the right thing was to do. We legitimately didn’t know.”

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Many people believe that hygiene theatre is harmless. The state of public restrooms is better than it has ever been. People might be lulled into a false feeling of security by hygiene theatre. Hygiene theatre may be deliberately harmful because it inhibits individuals from making educated decisions about how much risk they are prepared to take in their life.

Hygiene theatre is, at its core, an unavoidable reaction to the biggest public health catastrophe in a century. Because when things spiral out of control, humans do the only thing they know how to do: try to inflict structure on chaos one hand sanitiser at a time.