A man attacked a policewoman with a knife on Friday in western France, seriously wounding her and sparking a manhunt, local police said. The suspect, still armed, was on the run after the attack in La Chapelle-sur-Erdre near Nantes, and police dispatched 80 officers to pursue him, a police source said. Pupils in the area's primary and middle schools were kept indoors, a city official told AFP. A source close to the investigation said that the policewoman's injuries were life-threatening. French police officers have demanded better protection and harsher punishment for attacks against them. Earlier this month, officer Eric Masson was shot dead while investigating activity at a known drug-dealing site in the southern city of Avignon. Masson's death came after the April 23 killing of Stephanie Monferme, a police employee who was stabbed to death in the town of Rambouillet outside Paris in the latest jihadist attack in France. sm-faa-gab/jh/ach