Early treatment with potassium iodide cures emphyema

Found this old case study using potassium iodide to kill off the various fungus in farmers with emphysema.

Just do a search of iodide.

AGRICULTURE, employing some 749,700 persons in the year 1936, is
\ one of the largest industries in this country. Its workers are liable to
infection by organic matter, the micro-fungi and bacteria which exist in the
grasses, straw, grain, foliage, fruits and soil, or the excreta of the animals
amongst which they work; occasionally by inorganic matter, as when employed
in carting stone, they may be exposed to a silica risk, as observed by Middleton.15
They are particularly liable to "Asthma," "Bronchitis" and "Pneumonia,"
frequently of a type which runs a protracted course, and I can recall many such
cases which came under my care when I was a country practitioner amid the
hills of the Lake District. The patients ultimately recovered on a mixture of
Potassium Iodide and Creosote, drugs urged by my father as the result of many
years' experience. It is possible that some of these cases were mycotic in origin.

http://bjr.birjournals.org/content/11/126/378.full.pdf+html