Giving a young child with fever a tepid bath may help soothe parents anxious to do something, but is of little actual benefit to the child. Non-pharmaceutical measures that are occasionally employed to reduce fever include sponging the child with lukewarm water or using a fan to cool the environment.
But in reality, these measures do not really treat the fever, although they can make the child more comfortable.
Furthermore, these other measures, particularly bathing, can be traumatic to the child. The researchers conducted a literature review and found seven international articles that assessed the effectiveness of alternate ways to reduce fever in children, aside from the use of acetaminophen (known as paracetamol in England). All of the articles assessed sponging.
And all the authors concluded that in the first half-hour to hour after sponging, a child's fever is reduced slightly, but even that effect is short-lived. This is because non-pharmaceutical measures do not work directly on the body's thermostat.
It's like central heating, if you have the thermostat set high, and then open the windows to cool the room, it is unlikely to work because the heating will just work harder to keep the room at the thermostat setting.
What you need to do is reset the thermostat. This is what (fever-reducing) medications do.
Archives of Disease in Childhood 2000;82:238-239
In general, it is unwise to reduce a fever unless the person (child or adult) is absolutely miserable or the fever is over 102 or 103. There is an exaggerated concern that many parents have regarding fever.
They are unaware that there really is no brain damage until the temperature gets beyond 105 or so. Now, I do get concerned when the temperature is above 102, but I would still hold off on using aspirin or Tylenol unless the person was feeling very uncomfortable.
These drugs actually inhibit the body's immune response and actually tend to prolong the illness rather then resolving it more quickly.