RALEIGH -- Medical experts say too many teenagers are putting themselves at risk for skin cancer by ignoring the warnings about indoor tanning. 

A new survey found that 30 percent of high school students had used tanning beds in the past year. Dr. Jeffrey Gershenwald of the MD Anderson Cancer Center says thousands of North Carolinians will learn they have melanoma this year.

"And so broken out by state, it's anticipated that over 2,600 North Carolinians will be diagnosed with invasive melanomas this year alone," he said.

Gershenwald said the World Health Organization has put tanning beds in the same cancer-causing category as tobacco. North Carolina lawmakers considered a ban on tanning beds this year for anyone under the age of 18, but it didn't pass.