Cash cut mortality in children under 5 by about 45%, the study researchers found, on par with interventions like vaccines and anti-malarials. Historically, it’s been “difficult to study the impacts of cash transfers on mortality with any sort of rigor,” he says. It took a year to do.”They found that cash had major benefits for infant and child mortality, especially when it was delivered close to birth. Cash made the biggest difference for families who live roughly 30 minutes or less away from a health care facility staffed with physicians. “The answer is not we give cash alone, or we just focus on improving the health care system,” she says.