Patients with mild pneumonia can choose to take medications that can help them get better without fluids. For mild pneumonia with only a mild cough and sputum and limited lung inflammation, the appropriate anti-inflammatory medications can be taken orally to achieve a cure. For more serious lung infections that result in pneumonia, taking medication without fluids may not completely improve the condition and may even delay it, such as diffuse lung infections that can be cured by choosing the appropriate anti-inflammatory drugs, for example, lobar pneumonia in both lungs must be cured by choosing penicillin or erythromycin antibiotics that are administered intravenously for 1 week.