Diabetes is more common in patients who drink a can of artificially sweetened soft drink a day compared with those who drink the equivalent in sugary drinks, suggests an Australian cohort study.

Published in Diabetes & Metabolism, the study found that participants who said they drank at least one artificially sweetened beverage a day were 38% more likely to have type 2 diabetes than those who never drank it.

For those who drank at least one sugar-sweetened beverage, the likelihood was only 23% more than those who did not.

Study author Distinguished Professor Barbora de Courten said the results were surprising, although they did not necessarily indicate that artificially sweetened drinks were less healthy than sugary drinks as they were not compared against each other.