Women who drink two or more diet sodas a day are 30 percent more likely to have a heart attack and 50 percent more likely to die than those who rarely drink it.

That's according to a study published Saturday led by Dr. Ankur Vyas, a cardiovascular disease expert at the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinic.

It's not the drinks themselves that can potentially kill, instead it may be a woman's way to "make up for other unhealthy habits."

Diet sodas have long been known as a replacement for the sugary regular sodas but aren't going to help people lose weight. In fact, it may make them eat more.

Vyas's study was conducted over a period of 10 years and it included almost 60,000 middle-aged women. He asked them to fill out a questionaire about their diets, including beverages that they drink and whether or not they consumed diet beverages.

At about the nine-year mark, Vyas and his researchers checked on the womens' health. They found that 8.5 percent of the women who drink two or more diet drinks a day had some sort of heart disease.

Of the women who drank no diet drinks, or just a couple per month, 7.2 percent were found to have some sort of heart disease.

"We only found an association, so we can't say that diet drinks cause these problems," Vyas said.

Despite being a fairly low risk of heart disease, Vyas added the women who drank diet drinks were also likely to have other bad habits or afflictions such as smoking, being overweight and having high blood pressure.

The American Beverage Association responded to Vyas's study by saying, "it is impossible to attribute their cardiovascular health issues to their diet beverage intake."

It's hard to tell whether something in the diet drinks are causing these effects on women or if it's the fact that those who drink diet sodas often have other unhealthy habits as well, researchers say.