Chennai Corporation Mayor M. Subramanian on Thursday denied any outbreak of cholera in the city and refuted the AIADMK leader J. Jayalalithaa's claim that the civic body run hospitals were poorly maintained.

Subramanian rubbished the media reports on cholera outbreak in north Chennai and visited the Corporation-run Communicable Diseases Hospital (CDH) in Tondiarpet and interacted with the patients admitted with suspected diarrheal diseases.

The Mayor said that the number of admissions with symptoms like diarrhea has decreased in the CDH due to the prevailing change in weather conditions and said that it was only due to sewer leakages into pipes carrying drinking water in north Chennai which was due to the construction of new drains by Metro Water and the Corporation.

But a close look at patient records of the Communicable Diseases Hospital, Tondiarpet says that the recent spurt of diarrhea cases is reaching endemic proportions.

Hospital sources said over 80 patients have been admitted to CDH for water-borne diseases from areas III and IV in the last fortnight alone and added that chances of cholera could not be ruled out though the government was unwilling to admit the same.