system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5:Why, when we are sick do we take medications meant to lower our fever? Isn't a fever one of the body's ways of fighting infection? Aren't we reducing our immune system's efficacy by doing this?

I mean, I know fevers can run high enough to become life-threatening and in that case anti-fever drugs are lifesavers, but short of that it seems to me we should let the body do what it needs to in order to get rid of what's making it ill.
gpt
It's an interesting question. No doubt fever is part of our immune response. Fever is the result mainly of cytokines (like the immune systems hormones) released from where the infection in the body is activating the immune system and going through the blood stream to the temperature control center in the brain stem. The increased body temperature can act like a signal to the whole body to go in to a sort of "ready state" where cells downscale some of their activity, while increasing other, in order to prepare and be more resistant to bacterial and viral infections. With the fever comes also the general feeling of malice which will make the individual rest, not use energy more than required. The eleveted body temperature likely is more negative to bacteria and viruses than it is to our own cells.

All this being said there is very little data to support the claim that lowering fever prolongs infectious diseases. In fact it seems it doesn't matter. That must mean that in humans, in our modern society with the infections prevalent and with our current nutrional status etc. fever is not important and can be treated.

I would add that one downside to treating fever too much is that you may trick yourself in to thinking you are well when in fact you are not, which may promote the spread of disease (you go to work or school while you're still infectious) or it could lead to complications arising from too early return to physical activity.