The raids of two tax-funded and privately run healthcare centres in the Swedish city of Göteborg in March 2025 is the latest development in an allegedly accelerating trend of criminal infiltration in Swedish tax-funded welfare services. If not contained, these companies risk outcompeting local providers of welfare services, strengthening the lobby for increased marketisation and diverting tax funds intended for the delivery of welfare in several European countries, just as they have in Sweden. It is important to highlight an additional “risk factor”: the somewhat romantic view of the Swedish welfare state, which has persisted ever since Sweden was described as an archetypical social democratic welfare state.