The reason soy would be preferred over cows milk is related to some of the issues that were raised regarding donor breast milk; for some observant Jews, cow's milk must come from cows that were milked under supervision to guarantee that no other milk was added, from an animal that we are forbidden to eat such as a pig or a horse. Some observant Jews trust in the laws of the health dept. that also forbid adding any other milk, so they will use dairy products made from milk that is not necessarily obtained "under observation". So they might use cows milk based formula when other observant jews might not. There is no such problem with soy, since it is a vegetable product. This is not to say that soy is the preferred fodd for Orthodox newborns!!! It is something that has gotten twisted so that people forget what is important and what isn't....Orthodox Jews are subject to formula propoganda just like anyone else. The drawbacks are never mentioned, re soy. But as the word gets out, more people will opt not to use it. There is a brand of cow milk based formula that does have supervision, when that first happened I was boiling mad, bec. then lots of mothers would feel comfortable using that instead of breastfeeding. However, many observant women will breastfeed due to the child spacing aspect bec. they don't use aritifical birth control. Hope this clarifies a complicated issue. Pearl Shifer, IBCLC NYC mailto:[log in to unmask] _____________________________________________________________________ You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail. Get completely free e-mail from Juno at http://www.juno.com Or call Juno at (800) 654-JUNO [654-5866]