Trifecta of Tyranny

According to Dr. Google's infinite wisdom:

These three concepts—the precautionary principle, the prevention paradox, and the collective action problem—form a vicious cycle in public policy, public health, and environmental management. They explain why it is so difficult to address massive, slow-moving crises (like pandemics or climate change) until it is too late.

The Precautionary Principle argues that in the face of serious, potentially irreversible threats, scientific uncertainty should not justify delaying action. Instead of waiting for absolute proof of harm, the burden of proof is shifted to require proponents to prove an action is safe. [1]
The Prevention Paradox describes a situation where an action brings immense benefits to the population as a whole, but offers little discernible benefit to the individual who took it. For example, staying home during a pandemic protects the community from collapse, but makes the individual feel like they unnecessarily sacrificed their freedom. [1, 2, 3]
The Collective Action Problem occurs when multiple individuals or nations would benefit from cooperating, but conflicting interests discourage joint action. Because the Prevention Paradox makes the individual sacrifice feel pointless, it breeds "free-riding" where people wait for others to bear the cost of the precaution. [1, 2, 3]

To overcome this, your first step should be to design policies that align individual incentives with collective goals. Focus on shifting the "cost" of the precaution so that it is virtually effortless for the individual—or impose clear penalties for non-compliance. When navigating a specific policy challenge, ask yourself: "How can I make the safe choice the easy and personally beneficial choice for everyone involved?"

Google is correct overall to an extent, but the devil is always in the details.  These three concepts have their place, much like the related concept of "externalities" (in the Pigouvian sense), but they all too easily can be taken too far, misapplied, and used as a fig leaf for Orwellian-style tyranny.  Caveat lector.

And finally, remember what "public health" really has become in practice these days.  A good functional definition nowadays would be, "the art and science of delaying the inevitable".