Indian-origin New York doctor Madhavi Aya was fighting coronavirus on the frontline when she contacted the disease.

What followed were mild symptoms, quarantine, escalation in heath issues and eventually her unfortunate demise.

This has been the story of many doctors, trying to save lives before succumbing to the same disease, all alone in their final moments.

Madhavi now only remains in the memory of her family members, who have nothing but her text messages to go back to.

One of these, her last, being:

Mom be back.

As cruel fate would have it, that couldn’t be possible. 

In her days in the hospital as a patient, Madhavi used to text her family regularly, and her last conversation with her daughter is now serving as a proof to millions of the high cost health professionals are paying for the safety of others.

In their final conversation, Madhavi’s daughter wrote:

Good morning mommy, it’s a new day. I am still praying for you to come back safely to me. I need you mommy. You’re the only one who understands me or tries to understands me.

And this is what her mother said:

Love you. Mom be back.

View this post on Instagram

These are the last texts of a hospital worker to her daughter. Madhvi Aya, who had been a doctor in India, worked in an emergency room in Brooklyn that was battered by the coronavirus. But within days of her last shift as a caregiver, she became infected. Aya, 61, was moved to a hospital less than 2 miles from her husband and 18-year-old daughter on Long Island, but they were not allowed to visit her. In a text with her family, she described horrible chest pain from trying to get out of bed. As she grew sicker, her texts came less frequently and in short, sporadic bursts. Her last message to her daughter was, “Mom be back.” She could not keep that promise. Front-line health care workers face a high risk of contracting the coronavirus, and scores have become sick. Aya’s text messages and her family’s account of her final days reveal a woman who spent much of her life devoted to medicine before succumbing to the cruel and familiar arc of a patient with Covid-19. Her early mild symptoms and quarantine at home were followed by a rapidly escalating illness and long waits for care, until she died alone. Read more at the link in our bio.

A post shared by The New York Times (@nytimes) on

Since the time they have been made public, these messages have been shared by thousands of people who feel the agony Madhav’s family members must be going through.

But one can only imagine their actual pain. For the sake of doctors, please stay home.