EPIC-Oxford cohort, 44,561 men and women in England/Scotland (34% self-identified vegetarian at baseline), mean 11.6-year follow-up, 1,235 incident IHD cases (1,066 hospital admissions, 169 deaths). Vegetarians had 32% lower IHD risk than nonvegetarians (HR 0.68, 95% CI 0.58-0.81), attenuated only slightly by BMI adjustment, and not modified by sex/age/BMI/smoking/other IHD risk factors; vegetarians also had lower BMI, non-HDL cholesterol, and systolic BP. CAVEAT: the exposure contrast is vegetarian-vs-nonvegetarian dietary pattern (most EPIC-Oxford vegetarians are lacto-ovo, i.e. still egg-eating), not a quantitative egg-intake gradient — this is the best available EPIC-Oxford hard-endpoint result but is a weaker direct test of “habitual egg intake” than the other sources in this pool. relevance_note: The brief’s named EPIC-Oxford anchor; best read as indirect/confounded evidence (dietary-pattern proxy) rather than a clean egg dose-response — flagged for step 2 to weight down accordingly.