That study was incredibly stupid. Corrupt and dishonest, even. The people using artificial sweeteners were also more likely to be fat, to eat a high carb diet, to exercise less and to use drugs to control things like high blood pressure. And no, you cannot statistically control for those factors unless you know exactly how much impact each factor exerts!
Take exercise, for example. No one know with any precision how much running impacts heart attacks. But this study had no idea what “exercise” people did or in what amounts. IIRC, it also used a questionnaire asking about the previous YEAR’s eating in the 1990s, and then assumed that hadn’t changed in the last 30 years!
They then added current use of artificial sweeteners to the mix.
IOW, it is a total garbage study. Then filtered by media reporters who know nothing themselves and who probably didn’t even read the abstract.
I'm sure that some diabetics use the stuff there, but France may be the worst "first world" country in which to seek problems caused by sugar substitutes.