Royal baby boy is born: the facts

A staff member of the Madame Tussauds Tokyo wax museum prepares decorations next to the wax figures of Britain's Prince William and his wife Catherine (Reuters)

• The baby boy was born at 16:24 on Monday 22 July
• He weighed 8lb 6oz and was born at the private Lindo Wing of St Mary's Hospital
• Clarence House tweeted the news at 8.35pm, and it's been retweeted over 15,000 times
• A town crier confirmed the announcement outside the hospital
• A bulletin - signed by the Queen's gynaecologist Marcus Setchell, who led the medical team that delivered the baby - said: "Her Royal Highness and her child are both doing well."
• Trafalgar Square was lit up blue
• The BT Tower had the message: "It's a boy!"
• The news was tickered in lights at Times Square, New York
• The Niagara Falls were also lit up in blue
• US president Barack Obama said: "We wish them all the happiness and blessings parenthood brings"
• Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd sent a bilby toy and the prince will have a zoo enclosure named after him.
• George is the bookmakers' favourite name, followed by James and Alexander.
• At 14:00 this afternoon, after riding past Buckingham Palace the King's Troop Royal Horse Artillery will stage a 41-gun salute in Green Park.
• BBC royal correspondent Peter Hunt said it was unlikely the Queen would visit her great-grandchild in hospital.
• The Prince of Wales said: "I am enormously proud and happy to be a grandfather for the first time."
• The Duchess of Cornwall said: "It's wonderful for the grandfather. He's brilliant with children so he'll have a wonderful time."
• At its peak, there were more than 25,000 tweets per minute about the royal baby's birth, and it has been mentioned over two million times on Twitter

And a sobering statistic: The royal baby is just one in 2,000 born in the UK yesterday - but poverty will hit one in three of them