A recent report concluded thousands of U.S. businesses are using massage therapy as cover for sex trafficking, but two groups representing the industry said the data is misleading and causes "misguided" state and local governments to create burdensome regulations to combat the alleged problem.

Research shows that 6,500 to 9,000 businesses in the U.S. use the label massage therapy to hide the fact they are engaging in sex trafficking, according to the most recent Human Trafficking Task Force report by the Federation of State Massage Therapy Boards. The task force made several recommendations for addressing the problem, including creating another task force to study massage establishment licensing. http://bit.ly/2j2WQvI

In a joint statement to Massage magazine, the American Massage Therapy Association and Associated Bodywork AND Massage Professionals called the task force's conclusions "badly off-base." They say the report could lead to state licensing boards to make changes "outside the boundaries and purposes for which they were formed."

Among their complaints, the two associations said the task force did not differentiate between human trafficking and prostitution. They also said the report ignored FBI and Homeland Security data.

"Addressing both human trafficking in general and prostitution specifically is the province of law enforcement, not massage therapists or regulators of the massage therapy profession," the associations said.

The groups called on better enforcement of existing laws concerning human trafficking and prostitution rather than the creation of new regulations on the industry. http://bit.ly/2Ah4L1V

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