The use "预防" in a sentence

[Rai]

I have been studying Chinese for about three years now and with intense study I believe I am around a 5th or 6th year level of Mandarin. As I am taking AP Chinese current laoshi was absent for about a month due to personal reasons. I took it up myself to translate a news article in from Chinese to English for practice. 预防 was one of the words I saw and didn't quite know what it meant.

My only understanding of the word is that it means "safeguard" but I have no further understanding of this word? Could someone help me learn its use and possibly show me an example sentence with it? Thanks!

[zigzagzerg]

预防 means prevent something in advance

ex

预防火灾 prevent a fire

预防疾病 prevent diseases

often used in gov files. I think you understand now.

[tooironic]

Consider 预防胜于治疗 - "prevention is better than a cure".

[femetis]

预防 is 'take precautions'

or you may regard it as Prevent

but prevent (阻止) is a bit different from 预防:

阻止 means sth has happened or more likely is happening

we have to 阻止 to stop it continue to happen / happen again

yet

预防 means such thing nvr happen before and very likely to happen soon

thus we do 预防 to let it not happen

If we go deeper in this phrase and split 预防 into 预 and 防

we will notice that 预 means "pre-"

预知 precognition

预先 in advance / beforehand

while 防 means 'guard', 'defend', 'prevent'

In Chinese, 预防 is used in formal context

just like #2 said

I think this might help you

For further clarification

Feel free to ask