The death toll in the melamine scandal may be higher than China's government suggests based on a recent revelation that at least five more children died after drinking infant formula tainted with the industrial chemical.

One of the deaths that may be linked to the scandal occurred in Liti village in Henan province in central China's wheat and corn flatlands.

Farmer Li Xiaoquan and his wife were the parents of baby twin girls, but tragedy struck just before dawn on Sept. 10 when one of the nine-month-old infants died of kidney failure.

The previous month, an ultrasound examination of baby Xiaokai's kidneys at the Zhengzhou Children's Hospital had found a stone in each kidney that was about the size of a small marble and two and a half times larger than what doctors consider a critical threshold.

Li's family and doctors have never been able to confirm how she got sick.

But just a day after Xiaokai died, state media reported that the type of formula milk the infant used to drink had been tainted with melamine.

Xiaokai, older than her twin, Xiaoyan, by three minutes, was fed formula milk while the younger girl nursed on breast milk because their mother did not have enough for both, family members said.

Li said he first learned of the contamination scandal from a relative who watched the news on television.

Although the cause of his daughter's death has not been confirmed, the grieving father puts the blame on the baby formula, which was produced by state-owned Sanlu, the diary at the centre of the contaminated milk scandal.

China's Health Ministry said three infants died from drinking melamine-tainted milk and up to 50,000 were made ill.

Yet the deaths of Xiaokai and at least four other babies reported by the Associated Press have not been included in China's official death toll, suggesting that the tainted milk scandal may have exacted a higher human toll than the government has acknowledged.

Nobody is suggesting large numbers of deaths are being concealed, but so many months passed before the scandal was exposed that it is likely that more babies fell sick or died than official figures reflect.

Families of uncounted victims unable to sue for compensation

The families of the uncounted victims of the scandal fear that the lack of an official verdict on their children's deaths means they will be unable to bring lawsuits and claim compensation.

Even though he is determined to sue for compensation from either the government or Sanlu, Li accepts that the chance of winning is "slim."

But that chance received a small boost last week when lawyers for dozens of families whose children were sickened by tainted milk decided to launch a class-action lawsuit against Sanlu, hoping to pressure Chinese authorities still dithering over compensation.

After weeks of discussions, the 15 lawyers decided to bundle cases involving nearly 100 families into a single lawsuit seeking medical and other expenses, payments for trauma and compensation for the families of those who died.

Since the melamine scandal was first reported in September, Beijing has confirmed that the Shijiazhuang Sanlu Group knew as early as last year that its products were tainted with the chemical and that company and local officials first tried to cover it up.

The government has promised free medical treatment to the children made ill and unspecified compensation to them and families of the dead.

But the Health Ministry, which is co-ordinating the government's response, so far declined to answer questions about the compensation plan and whether it was investigating deaths and illnesses not yet counted by the government.

Back in Liti Village, Li and his wife struggle to come to terms with the loss of their baby daughter — their grief compounded by the fact that they do not know where the infant is buried.

In some parts of China, the death of a child is considered a misfortune that can bring bad luck on a family and is best suppressed.

After her death, Li handed Xiaokai's body to his cousin and three other villagers.

They took her to the far side of the village fields and put her in a shallow grave under a path between rows of poplar trees.

No close family members were there and apart from the four men, no one knows where the baby girl is buried.