New Delhi, Aug. 5 -- MIAMI - Shortly after 1 a.m. Tuesday, the comment section of Mario Lavandeira's TikTok livestream stopped functioning as an audience and started functioning as a dispatch. Viewers watching the feed began typing that they were calling 911, that he needed help, that they were frightened. By the time Miami-Dade Fire Rescue and the Miami-Dade Sheriff's Office arrived at his home in Westchester, a residential neighborhood in southwest Miami-Dade County, hundreds had watched on a screen what the county's emergency services then had to manage in person.

Lavandeira, 48, better known as Perez Hilton, was transported by ambulance from the residence in the early hours of Wednesday. The Miami-Dade Sheriff's Office confirmed it h...