I am not at all convinced money was the issue.
I've gone to the ER twice with terrible kidney infections, screaming and crying and puking my guts out with pain; they won't give me morphine until they've run all kinds of tests on me to ensure that I do, in fact, have a kidney infection. No amount of money (or lack thereof) would change that. It's hospital policy. Apparently junkies have learned to fake kidney infections very effectively, in order to gain access to that IV drip of morphine.
Prescription drugs are not just handed out willy-nilly, even if someone appears to actually be ill. You'd probably also find that neither CVS nor any other reputable pharmacy would sell this woman and her boyfriend a ten-pack of points without a prescription, even if she claimed to be slipping into a diabetic coma.
The law mandates that prescription drugs be dispensed only with a prescription.
If I were a clerk, I would not disregard that law, no matter how convincingly ill someone seemed. Rather, I would call an ambulance.
If you give them a prescription med without a prescription and they die, you could be tried for murder, on top of numerous other charges.
That's not a risk I'd take for a stranger, not for any amount of money.
They can wait for the damned ambulance.