The Food and Drug Administration is alerting Asian and ethnic markets across the United States that infant formula made in China may be contaminated.

The FDA is working with state health agencies across the country to alert members of Chinese American communities to the danger.

Newspapers in China report that some infant formula has been linked to kidney problems and kidney stones in babies there because the formula contains melamine — the same industrial contaminant from China that poisoned and killed thousands of U.S. dogs and cats last year when it was used in pet food.

No baby formula approved for use in the U.S. is manufactured in China, according to the FDA. "We want to reassure the public that there's no contamination in the domestic supply of infant formula," says Janice Oliver, deputy of operations at the FDA's Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition.

In addition, no U.S. manufacturers or marketers of infant formula receive ingredients from China.

"We contacted all of them," Oliver says.

The FDA is concerned that illegal infant formula may be sold in Asian and ethnic markets. That happened in 2004, when fake infant formula from China, which killed dozens of babies in that country, was found in at least one U.S. store.

"We don't want any babies to get sick. None of this should be in the United States. We're not aware of anyone finding it here, but knowing that it happened once before, we want to get the word out," Oliver says.

Reports in the Chinese news media say that as many as 60 babies have been admitted to hospitals with kidney stones and that the illnesses have been linked to powdered formula.

Melamine is a byproduct of plastic manufacturing. It has been used to fraudulently mimic high-protein additives such as wheat and rice gluten.