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Tomas Anez Dos Santos toiled in a tiny glade deep in the of Peru rainforest when he heard sounds coming closer through the thick forest.

He realized he was encircled, and froze.

“One stood, directing with an bow and arrow,” he remembers. “Unexpectedly he noticed that I was present and I began to escape.”

He found himself encountering the Mashco Piro tribe. For a long time, Tomas—dwelling in the modest village of Nueva Oceania—served as almost a neighbour to these wandering individuals, who reject engagement with foreigners.

An updated document from a rights organization indicates remain a minimum of 196 termed “isolated tribes” left in the world. The group is thought to be the biggest. It states 50% of these groups might be wiped out over the coming ten years if governments don't do further actions to defend them.

It claims the biggest threats come from deforestation, extraction or operations for crude. Uncontacted groups are exceptionally at risk to common illness—as such, the study states a threat is presented by interaction with religious missionaries and social media influencers seeking engagement.

In recent times, Mashco Piro people have been coming to Nueva Oceania increasingly, based on accounts from residents.

The village is a fishing village of seven or eight clans, sitting atop on the edges of the local river in the heart of the Peruvian jungle, half a day from the nearest town by canoe.

The territory is not designated as a safeguarded area for remote communities, and deforestation operations function here.

According to Tomas that, on occasion, the noise of logging machinery can be noticed day and night, and the Mashco Piro people are observing their forest disrupted and destroyed.

Within the village, residents state they are divided. They are afraid of the tribal weapons but they hold strong regard for their “kin” dwelling in the forest and desire to safeguard them.

“Allow them to live according to their traditions, we are unable to change their traditions. This is why we maintain our space,” says Tomas.

The people in Nueva Oceania are anxious about the harm to the Mascho Piro's livelihood, the risk of aggression and the possibility that loggers might introduce the Mashco Piro to illnesses they have no immunity to.

During a visit in the settlement, the group made their presence felt again. Letitia Rodriguez Lopez, a young mother with a two-year-old child, was in the jungle gathering produce when she detected them.

“We detected shouting, cries from people, numerous of them. As though there were a crowd yelling,” she shared with us.

It was the initial occasion she had encountered the group and she escaped. After sixty minutes, her thoughts was continually pounding from terror.

“As exist deforestation crews and companies clearing the forest they're running away, perhaps due to terror and they come close to us,” she explained. “We are uncertain what their response may be with us. That is the thing that terrifies me.”

Recently, a pair of timber workers were confronted by the group while fishing. One was wounded by an projectile to the abdomen. He survived, but the second individual was found lifeless days later with nine puncture marks in his body.

The Peruvian government has a policy of non-contact with secluded communities, rendering it illegal to initiate encounters with them.

This approach was first adopted in Brazil following many years of advocacy by community representatives, who noted that first exposure with isolated people could lead to entire groups being decimated by illness, poverty and malnutrition.

In the 1980s, when the Nahau tribe in Peru made initial contact with the world outside, 50% of their people succumbed within a short period. During the 1990s, the Muruhanua tribe faced the similar destiny.

“Isolated indigenous peoples are very vulnerable—in terms of health, any contact might spread sicknesses, and even the simplest ones could decimate them,” states Issrail Aquisse from a local advocacy organization. “In cultural terms, any contact or interference can be highly damaging to their way of life and survival as a society.”

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