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The resident Tomas Anez Dos Santos worked in a tiny open space deep in the Peruvian rainforest when he noticed footsteps approaching through the thick jungle.

He realized that he had been surrounded, and halted.

“A single individual positioned, aiming with an bow and arrow,” he recalls. “And somehow he noticed of my presence and I commenced to flee.”

He had come confronting the Mashco Piro. For a long time, Tomas—dwelling in the modest settlement of Nueva Oceania—served as almost a local to these wandering individuals, who shun contact with strangers.

A new study from a rights organisation indicates there are no fewer than 196 described as “isolated tribes” left worldwide. This tribe is believed to be the largest. The study says half of these groups might be decimated in the next decade if governments neglect to implement additional measures to safeguard them.

It claims the biggest threats come from timber harvesting, digging or exploration for oil. Remote communities are highly susceptible to ordinary disease—as such, it says a danger is presented by exposure with religious missionaries and digital content creators seeking engagement.

Lately, members of the tribe have been coming to Nueva Oceania increasingly, as reported by inhabitants.

This settlement is a fishing hamlet of a handful of clans, sitting high on the banks of the Tauhamanu waterway deep within the Peruvian Amazon, 10 hours from the closest town by watercraft.

The territory is not designated as a protected zone for isolated tribes, and deforestation operations work here.

Tomas reports that, at times, the racket of industrial tools can be heard day and night, and the community are witnessing their jungle disrupted and devastated.

Within the village, inhabitants state they are conflicted. They are afraid of the Mashco Piro's arrows but they also have profound admiration for their “kin” who live in the woodland and want to safeguard them.

“Permit them to live in their own way, we must not change their culture. For this reason we preserve our separation,” explains Tomas.

Inhabitants in Nueva Oceania are anxious about the damage to the community's way of life, the risk of violence and the likelihood that timber workers might subject the tribe to diseases they have no immunity to.

During a visit in the village, the tribe made their presence felt again. A young mother, a resident with a young child, was in the jungle gathering fruit when she detected them.

“There were calls, shouts from individuals, many of them. Like there were a large gathering calling out,” she shared with us.

That was the initial occasion she had encountered the tribe and she ran. After sixty minutes, her thoughts was continually racing from fear.

“Because exist loggers and operations destroying the woodland they're running away, possibly out of fear and they come near us,” she stated. “We don't know how they will behave to us. That's what frightens me.”

Two years ago, a pair of timber workers were confronted by the Mashco Piro while angling. A single person was wounded by an arrow to the stomach. He lived, but the other person was located lifeless days later with several injuries in his frame.

The Peruvian government follows a policy of non-contact with isolated people, establishing it as prohibited to initiate interactions with them.

The policy originated in Brazil subsequent to prolonged of campaigning by tribal advocacy organizations, who saw that early contact with isolated people could lead to whole populations being eliminated by illness, destitution and malnutrition.

Back in the eighties, when the Nahau tribe in the country came into contact with the world outside, a significant portion of their population perished within a matter of years. During the 1990s, the Muruhanua tribe suffered the same fate.

“Isolated indigenous peoples are highly susceptible—from a disease perspective, any exposure may spread diseases, and even the most common illnesses may wipe them out,” states a representative from a Peruvian indigenous rights group. “In cultural terms, any exposure or interference may be very harmful to their way of life and survival as a group.”

For local residents of {