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RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil (AP) - Drug users who don't engage in dealing will no longer be sent to prison under a new drug law now in effect across Brazil, officials said Friday.
The law, which went into force this week, no longer calls for the imprisonment of people caught with small quantities of narcotics for personal use. Instead, they will be subject them to alternative penalties such as community service and could be required to undergo drug treatment, the justice ministry's press office said.
National Anti-drug Secretary Paulo Roberto Uchoa told reporters in Brasilia, the nation's capital, that thanks to the new law drug users will no longer be "persecuted by society."
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