The Batek are nomadic hunters and gatherers, so the exact location of their settlements change within the general confines of the area that they inhabit.

Historically they traded with the local populations while other times they were subjected to exploitation, raids, slavery in Malaya, paying tributes to the Malays.

For more than a thousand years, some Negrito tribes from the southern forests were enslaved and exploited until modern times while others remain in isolation and avoided contact.

[6] Until about 1970 much of inland peninsular Malaysia was difficult to reach for the purposes of logging, so the Batek were widespread throughout that region.

Somethings where there is a personal property right, but social norms dictate that it be shared with the entire society such as food that is found by foraging.

If that does not end the disagreement, each will publicly share their side of the argument in an attempt to have other members of the camp suggest a resolution.

Since the hunting and butchering of meat causes a large amount of food to enter the camp at once, there is a more formal and ritualistic way of dividing it, for example with a monkey, first the members of the hunting party eat the offal and tail, because they cook the fastest, then the cooked meat is divided into about 13 parts, so that each family in the camp gets some, with the portions adjusted according to the size of the family.

There are two more practical reasons that sharing and kindness are widespread in the Batek community, first each man has a blowgun, used mainly for hunting, so if all in the group did not get along, someone could be subject to violence.

Also the rain forest is very hot and damp so keeping things long-term is impractical, food will rot and hardware will rust if it is not used frequently.

[20][21] The disease was firstly thought as a mysterious illness for nearly a month before being finally confirmed as measles by the Malaysian Health Ministry following growing national attention on the outbreak.

[22][23] The cause of the spread in the community is due to low coverage of MMR immunisation which is attributed to the relatively low immunisation rate among the community with their nomadic lifestyle with findings by Malaysian Health Ministry found that although 61.5% of the villagers received their first measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) shots, only 30% of them had their follow-up shots.