Doping cases holding back Ugandan athletes

You wake up to celebrate a record-breaking performance, only to learn almost as an afterthought that the athlete had already served a doping ban, the race was real, the medal counts, but the story behind it feels delayed.

That is the discomfort many are grappling with following revelations around Adaejah Hodge.

Hodge had already served a two-year doping ban beginning August 30, 2024, so that means the suspension had already been served, the athlete reinstated on January 28, 2026 and competition resumed as she won the NCAA Indoor Title in 200m and also helping Georgia win the 2026 NCAA Championship Team Title.

The explanation, non-intentional use, cooperation, a reduced sanction may be technically sound but the timing matters and, in this case, it raises more questions than answers.

When the Athletics Integrity Unit delays disclosure until after an athlete’s return, it does not just manage a process, it creates a gap and that gap is quickly filled with speculation, doubt, and public mistrust, because if integrity is what sport promises, then transparency is how it proves it.

In Uganda, we are confronting a more painful reality. Over the past two years, several of our top female athletes have been caught in doping cases not out of defiance, but often out of vulnerability. 

From Janat Chemusto’s four-year ban to Prisca Chesang’s suspension linked to a masking agent, and more recently Mercyline Chelangat, the pattern is difficult to ignore. The explanations are familiar, unintentional ingestion, lack of awareness.

Our female athletes are often navigating high-performance environments without the support systems that should come with it. Training across borders, managing pressure, and relying on advice that is not always medically or professionally guided. 

When a young athlete in Kapchorwa is handed a supplement and told it will aid recovery, who does she turn to for verification? In most cases, no one.

So yes, we are losing medals but more than that, we are losing careers, careers cut short not by deliberate cheating, but by gaps in knowledge and protection.

While the world debates the timing of Hodge’s case, we must confront our own urgency. We cannot afford to wait for sanctions to tell us something is wrong. By then, the damage is already done.

A National Anti-Doping framework cannot remain reactive. It must evolve into an active education system, one that reaches athletes before mistakes are made. Sports nutritionists should not be a luxury for elite camps alone, but a standard across development structures, including our youth teams pathways.

Because if we do not close this information gap, we will continue to watch promising careers unravel under the same explanation unintentional.