UNCONDITIONAL CASH TRANSFER Unconditional cash transfers are cash payments provided to financially disadvantaged people without requiring anything in return. Governments in low- and middle-income countries increasingly use these to reduce poverty or other vulnerabilities, such as those related to health. In 2011, up to a billion people received a form of cash transfer. For the first time, a team of public health experts from across the globe (including Dr Ruhi Saith, a senior consultant at OPM India) collaborated to assess the effects of such cash transfers on health services use, health outcomes, social determinants of health, and healthcare expenditure among children and adults in low- and middle-income countries. A total of 21 studies covering more than one million participants and over thirty thousand households in Africa, the Americas, and southeast Asia were reviewed. Almost all studies were large-scale, randomised controlled trials (with cash transfer reci...