The epidemic has so far infected nearly 2,000 people and experts have warned the outbreak is the worst the country has seen in more than 50 years.
Plague, also known as the Black Death, is an annual occurrence on the island nation, but this year’s breakout is especially severe because it has spread into major towns and cities.
At least 143 people have been killed so far, and officials have been forced to go to extreme lengths in their fight to contain the spread.
Special measures being used to prevent infection include sending health workers equipped with anti-bacterial chemicals to treat bodies of suspected plague victims.
The remains are then placed in a sealed body bag and buried in a common grave, a practice which goes against Madagascan culture.
And health workers are now reporting police are seizing the remains of victims from their families because their loved ones are unsure about what to do with the body.
Charlotte Ndiaye, a World Health Organisation (WHO) worker helping to combat the epidemic, told South Africa’s Mail & Guardian: “The problem you have now among communities in Madagascar is that most families don’t want to give back the body.
“The police come to take the body. This is terrible. It is really terrible.”
Traditionally, some communities on the island exhume the corpses of their deceased relatives in an annual celebration to honour the dead.
But health officials are concerned this practice will fuel the spread of the disease and cause outbreaks in other regions.
Madagascar typically sees around 600 cases of plague each year, but they are usually confined to the island’s rural areas.
This year’s outbreak includes both the bubonic strain, which spreads through the bites of infected fleas, and the far more contagious pneumonic strain, which is passed on between people through coughing, sneezing and spitting.
The disease is treatable with antibiotics, and health officials have already sent thousand of doses to the island nation.
However it is often fatal if left untreated and the illness was responsbile, along with a series of other infectious diseases, for the deaths of around 100million in the Middle Ages.
Madagascar’s ‘plague season’ is expected to last for another six months, the WHO has warned.
And Paul Hunter, professor of health protection at the prestigious University of East Anglia, has predicted it could spread to mainland Africa.
Speaking to MailOnline last week, he said: “The big anxiety is it could spread to mainland Africa, it’s not probable, but certainly possible, that might then be difficult to control.
“If we don’t carry on doing stuff here, at one point something will happen and it will get out of hand control cause huge devastation all around the world.”