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The resident Tomas Anez Dos Santos was laboring in a tiny glade far in the of Peru Amazon when he heard footsteps approaching through the lush forest.

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

“One positioned, aiming with an projectile,” he recalls. “Unexpectedly he noticed that I was present and I started to run.”

He had come encountering the Mashco Piro tribe. For decades, Tomas—dwelling in the modest community of Nueva Oceania—was practically a local to these nomadic people, who reject engagement with foreigners.

An updated report from a rights organization claims remain no fewer than 196 described as “remote communities” left in the world. This tribe is considered to be the most numerous. It states a significant portion of these communities could be decimated in the next decade if governments fail to take more to protect them.

It claims the greatest dangers stem from logging, mining or operations for crude. Isolated tribes are exceptionally vulnerable to basic disease—as such, it says a danger is posed by contact with religious missionaries and online personalities in pursuit of attention.

Lately, members of the tribe have been appearing to Nueva Oceania increasingly, according to locals.

This settlement is a fishing hamlet of several households, perched elevated on the edges of the Tauhamanu waterway in the center of the Peruvian Amazon, half a day from the closest town by watercraft.

The territory is not classified as a safeguarded area for uncontacted groups, and timber firms operate here.

Tomas reports that, at times, the sound of logging machinery can be noticed around the clock, and the community are observing their jungle disrupted and devastated.

In Nueva Oceania, people state they are conflicted. They dread the tribal weapons but they hold strong admiration for their “relatives” residing in the forest and desire to defend them.

“Allow them to live according to their traditions, we can't modify their traditions. That's why we preserve our distance,” explains Tomas.

Inhabitants in Nueva Oceania are anxious about the harm to the tribe's survival, the threat of conflict and the chance that deforestation crews might introduce the community to diseases they have no defense to.

At the time in the community, the Mashco Piro made themselves known again. A young mother, a woman with a two-year-old child, was in the woodland gathering food when she heard them.

“There were shouting, sounds from people, many of them. Like there were a large gathering calling out,” she told us.

That was the initial occasion she had met the group and she escaped. An hour later, her mind was continually throbbing from terror.

“Because there are deforestation crews and firms clearing the woodland they're running away, perhaps due to terror and they arrive in proximity to us,” she said. “We don't know how they will behave to us. That is the thing that scares me.”

Two years ago, two loggers were assaulted by the group while angling. One man was struck by an arrow to the stomach. He recovered, but the other man was found lifeless subsequently with several arrow wounds in his physique.

The administration maintains a policy of avoiding interaction with isolated people, making it prohibited to commence encounters with them.

The strategy was first adopted in Brazil following many years of advocacy by indigenous rights groups, who noted that initial exposure with remote tribes could lead to whole populations being eliminated by sickness, destitution and malnutrition.

During the 1980s, when the Nahau people in the country made initial contact with the outside world, half of their population succumbed within a matter of years. In the 1990s, the Muruhanua community faced the same fate.

“Isolated indigenous peoples are very susceptible—from a disease perspective, any interaction could spread illnesses, and even the simplest ones might decimate them,” states Issrail Aquisse from a local advocacy organization. “From a societal perspective, any contact or interference can be highly damaging to their life and health as a society.”

For local residents of {