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The resident Tomas Anez Dos Santos toiled in a small glade far in the of Peru jungle when he heard sounds approaching through the lush jungle.

It dawned on him that he had been hemmed in, and froze.

“A single individual stood, pointing with an arrow,” he recalls. “Unexpectedly he became aware that I was present and I started to run.”

He ended up face to face the Mashco Piro tribe. For a long time, Tomas—dwelling in the tiny village of Nueva Oceania—was virtually a local to these itinerant tribe, who avoid interaction with strangers.

A recent document from a advocacy group claims there are a minimum of 196 of what it calls “remote communities” in existence worldwide. The Mashco Piro is thought to be the most numerous. The study says half of these tribes might be wiped out in the next decade should administrations neglect to implement additional actions to defend them.

The report asserts the greatest risks are from deforestation, digging or drilling for petroleum. Uncontacted groups are extremely vulnerable to basic sickness—as such, the study notes a danger is caused by interaction with evangelical missionaries and social media influencers in pursuit of attention.

In recent times, the Mashco Piro have been coming to Nueva Oceania increasingly, according to inhabitants.

Nueva Oceania is a fishermen's village of seven or eight families, perched atop on the banks of the Tauhamanu River deep within the Peruvian rainforest, a ten-hour journey from the closest town by canoe.

This region is not designated as a preserved zone for isolated tribes, and deforestation operations operate here.

Tomas reports that, on occasion, the racket of heavy equipment can be detected continuously, and the Mashco Piro people are witnessing their jungle damaged and ruined.

Among the locals, inhabitants report they are conflicted. They dread the projectiles but they hold profound respect for their “kin” residing in the jungle and want to protect them.

“Allow them to live as they live, we can't modify their traditions. That's why we keep our space,” explains Tomas.

The people in Nueva Oceania are concerned about the damage to the tribe's survival, the danger of aggression and the possibility that deforestation crews might introduce the community to diseases they have no defense to.

While we were in the settlement, the group appeared again. A young mother, a resident with a two-year-old child, was in the woodland collecting food when she detected them.

“We detected calls, sounds from people, numerous of them. Like there was a whole group calling out,” she shared with us.

It was the first time she had encountered the Mashco Piro and she ran. An hour later, her thoughts was continually racing from fear.

“Since there are loggers and firms cutting down the forest they are escaping, maybe out of fear and they arrive in proximity to us,” she said. “We don't know how they might react with us. That is the thing that scares me.”

Recently, a pair of timber workers were assaulted by the Mashco Piro while catching fish. One man was wounded by an bow to the stomach. He lived, but the second individual was found deceased subsequently with multiple injuries in his body.

The Peruvian government maintains a policy of avoiding interaction with remote tribes, establishing it as illegal to initiate contact with them.

The strategy was first adopted in the neighboring country following many years of campaigning by community representatives, who saw that first interaction with secluded communities could lead to entire communities being eliminated by sickness, poverty and hunger.

Back in the eighties, when the Nahau tribe in the country made initial contact with the broader society, half of their people died within a few years. A decade later, the Muruhanua people experienced the identical outcome.

“Secluded communities are highly at risk—epidemiologically, any interaction might spread diseases, and even the most common illnesses could eliminate them,” explains Issrail Aquisse from a Peruvian indigenous rights group. “In cultural terms, any interaction or disruption may be very harmful to their way of life and survival as a group.”

For those living nearby of {