Press investigation exposes Łódź ambulance 'skin hunters' scandal

In early 2002, Polish journalists reported that some employees of the emergency ambulance service in Łódź, a large city in central Poland, were selling information about patients' deaths to funeral homes. The practice became known as the "skin hunters" (łowcy skór) affair, a slang term for people who profited from corpses.

The most serious claim went further than the sale of information. Reporting suggested that some paramedics may have deliberately hastened or caused the deaths of patients, so that funeral companies would pay for early tips about who had died. Prosecutors opened an investigation, and several people were later detained and tried.

The case caused a national shock. It damaged public trust in emergency medical care, prompted debate about oversight of ambulance crews and the funeral trade, and became one of the best-known press investigations in post-communist Poland. It also remained a reference point for later books, films and, now, a planned television series.