This study examines the impact of early life malaria exposure on cognition in sample of Mexican adults. It utilizes the nationwide introduction of a large-scale malaria eradication effort, along with the fact that regions with higher malarial burdens stood to gain most from the policy, to identify causal impacts. The core findings are that birth year exposure to malaria eradication was associated with increases in Raven Progressive Matrices test scores. In addition, cohorts born after eradication started school earlier than their pre-eradication counterparts. These effects were generally larger, more precisely estimated, and more robust to specification, for men vis-à-vis women. Collectively, these findings suggest that improvements in early childhood health may explain the secular increases in cognitive test scores observed by Flynn, and that parental investments may play an important role in the causal chain linking early life conditions and outcomes in adulthood.