WBRZ - Baton Rouge

BATON ROUGE - Parents in Baton Rouge are not surprised by a new study that discredits 1998 findings by Dr. Andrew Wakefield which linked autism to measles, mumps and rubella vaccines.

Wakefield's study showed twelve children who he said showed signs of autism about a week after their MMR vaccine.

This new study says Wakefield was paid $750,000 for his findings that were an "elaborate hoax." It alleges he changed the patients' medical history.

The debunking of Wakefield's study is not surprising to Dr. Chris Funes, "If it's not repeatable, it's not reliable, and in this instance, not only could no one get the same results he got, no one felt like he should've gotten the results he did from his data."

Kemee Hopper, the mother of two, never believed Wakefield's findings.

"I never gave any credibility to it, because the childhood diseases that come along-- they need vaccines, because you never know what can happen. You wouldn't want your child to get sick, and you didn't give them the vaccine," Hopper said.

Despite the reservations of Hopper and Funes, ten percent of the population still remains unprotected from MMR, according to the Centers for Disease Control.