Four year ban for pill popping Alice Aprot

Alice Aprot

DOPING Four year ban for pill popping Alice Aprot

James Magayi • 13:30 - 27.03.2023

Kenya Prisons officer said she did not know the name of the drug she took because she cannot read.

Two time African champion Alice Aprot of the Kenya Prisons has been banned from athletics for four years starting June 2022 after the Anti Doping Agency of Kenya found a prohibited substance in her urine sample during a routine out of competition test.

Aprot who won the Africa Cross Country title, Africa 10,000m title and African Games 10,000m title was found with Letrozole Metabolite Bis-(4-Cyanophenyl) Methanol in her sample leading to the ban.

The long distance athlete cooperated with the doping control officers and did not bother asking for a retest of her B-Sample. She admitted straight away that she bought some drugs from a pharmacy without consulting a doctor as should be the case.

Aprot explained to the tribunal that she was experiencing severe chest pains and was also having difficulty with milk production. The pains drove her to the pharmacy which sold her the drug in question. 

She also stated that she informed the pharmacists that she was an athlete and should not be given any drug that contains prohibited substances by the World Anti Doping Agency. However, when asked to provide the name of the drug she bought, Aprot gave another drug whose content differed with the samples found in her urine.

When asked the name of the drug she said she did not read because she is not educated enough. The jury hearing her case found her guilty of Anti Doping Rule Violation and slapped the four year ban from competition.

All her results from that period are also nullified

"We find that the athlete has failed to establish origin as her explanation to our comfortable satisfaction has failed to provided support as to how the prohibited substance entered her body. Without providing
any material evidence for our scrutiny we are unable to make any other finding.

"Indeed, even where the Respondent could not trace her treatment documents, she at the very least could have provided the names of the pharmacist or pharmacy that attended to her for the Applicant to verify. 

"The prescription that she gave as proof of her ailment was also shown not to have any benefit in proving where the substances could have originated from. We similarly make a finding that the Respondent had every intention to cheat having failed to meet the “origin” test." the tribunal stated