to avert · to prevent · to avoid · to refrain from

In this country, we rise or fall as one nation, as one people. Let's resist the temptation to fall back on the same partisanship and pettiness and immaturity that has poisoned our politics for so long.

Try to avoid making any more trouble.

Salt helps to preserve food from decay.

On the client side, very time-consuming operations should run asynchronously so as to avoid freezing the browser. The best example is the operation of Ajax.

For some companies their treatment of their employees or clients at any given time could affect their share prices and so inevitably have a great influence on the company’s success or failure.