A nationwide shortage on baby formula hitting the U.S. so bad that Republican Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas called it a "national crisis." But is this shortage affecting Guam, as well?

During a briefing, Monday, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki was asked about the nationwide shortage of baby formula. Retailers are putting limits on how many canisters of formula new parents can buy online and in stores due to supply chain issues and ingredient shortages to make the formula. In the briefing, Psaki said that the FDA is not only working to ensure the formula on the shelves is safe for infants and babies, but also working with suppliers to try and make more formula available sooner.

"What they, we are trying to do in the shorthand of is is increase supply by working with a range of manufacturers and what their capacity is to ensure that the kinds of formula that was recalled -- they're able to ensure it's on the shelves," she said.

With the shortage happening nationwide, KUAM sat down with one of the retailers, Pay-Less Supermarkets, to find out if Guam is experiencing this shortage as well. Chief People Officer Louise Borja says they aren't feeling the squeeze yet.

"If there is a shortage now, it’s basically trying to restock," she said. "Because of the delay, there was a little bit of a shortage, but right now, at this point, the shortage is actually coming from our local suppliers, but Pay-Less has been able to keep a good amount of baby formula on our shelves and as a matter of fact, we just received 50 cases to our Oka stores. So at this point, there was a little delay because of the recall."

It was back in February when KUAM reported that the baby formula products Similac, Alimentum and EleCare were recalled due to complaints of Cronobacter sakazakii and Salmonella Newport infections.

Borja added that all of the Pay-Less branches have an ample supply of baby formula. Should a shortage of formula hit the island, all Pay-Less can do is wait for the distributor to send more.

"We are really at the mercy of the distributors, which is, I believe MBI (Micronesian Brokers Incorporated) and Ambrose," she said. "So we just kind of, hopefully, that they would deliver as much cases as we can on a timely basis so that we don’t have a shortage. Again, like I said earlier, we did experience a bit of a shortage because of the recall, but at this point, across all of our stores, you could see a pretty good supply of Similac baby powder."

For now, nonprofits such as the Salvation Army also said they have enough baby formula to spare to families who need it. Capt Kari Rudd gave numbers of how many baby formulas they currently have.

"We have probably enough for, I would say, 20 families at this point," she said. "But we’re open to getting some more if that, in fact, is a need."

Parents should be on the lookout in the event the formula shortage hits the island.