A method of screening a sample for a multiplicity of respiratory pathogens to detect a particular pathogen in a solid phase amplification method, the method comprising: (a) isolating nucleic acid from the sample, which nucleic acid putatively comprises nucleic acid from two or more respiratory pathogens; (b) subjecting the nucleic acid to amplification in the presence of a beadset having subsets of beads to which oligonucleotide probes are immobilized with two or more combinations of primer pairs comprising forward primers selected from the group consisting of SEQ ID NOs:1 to 16, 33 and 35 and corresponding reverse primers selected from the group consisting of SEQ ID NOs:17 to 32, 34 and 36, respectively, wherein the primer pairs direct the amplification of a region of nucleic acid from a respiratory pathogen and wherein the amplicon is captured by hybridizing to said beadset, wherein the oligonucleotide probes are complementary to a region of an amplicon generated by amplification using the primer pair combinations and the corresponding probes are selected from 2 or more of the following sequences (SEQ ID NOs: 54, 76, 79, 82, 85, 88, 91, 94, 97, 100, 101, 104, 107, 108, 111, 114, 117, 120, 123, 126); and wherein one member of each primer pair comprises a first optically detectable label that is incorporated into a resulting amplicon following amplification; and wherein said beadset has subsets of beads, each subset being homogenous with respect to bead size and, optionally, intensity of a second optically detectable label, thereby creating a heterogeneous beadset based on size and/or second detectable label intensity and wherein the number of subsets corresponds to the number of respiratory pathogens to be screened; (c) determining to which of the beads an amplicon has bound on the basis of the intensity of the first detectable label and, where amplicons are bound to multiple subsets of beads, distinguishing between the multiple subsets of beads on the basis of bead size; wherein binding of an amplicon to a particular subset of beads is indicative of the presence of a particular respiratory pathogen in the sample. (a) isolating nucleic acid from the sample, which nucleic acid putatively comprises nucleic acid from two or more respiratory pathogens; (b) subjecting the nucleic acid to amplification in the presence of a beadset having subsets of beads to which oligonucleotide probes are immobilized with two or more combinations of primer pairs comprising forward primers selected from the group consisting of SEQ ID NOs:1 to 16, 33 and 35 and corresponding reverse primers selected from the group consisting of SEQ ID NOs:17 to 32, 34 and 36, respectively, wherein the primer pairs direct the amplification of a region of nucleic acid from a respiratory pathogen and wherein the amplicon is captured by hybridizing to said beadset, wherein the oligonucleotide probes are complementary to a region of an amplicon generated by amplification using the primer pair combinations and the corresponding probes are selected from 2 or more of the following sequences (SEQ ID NOs: 54, 76, 79, 82, 85, 88, 91, 94, 97, 100, 101, 104, 107, 108, 111, 114, 117, 120, 123, 126); and wherein one member of each primer pair comprises a first optically detectable label that is incorporated into a resulting amplicon following amplification; and wherein said beadset has subsets of beads, each subset being homogenous with respect to bead size and, optionally, intensity of a second optically detectable label, thereby creating a heterogeneous beadset based on size and/or second detectable label intensity and wherein the number of subsets corresponds to the number of respiratory pathogens to be screened; (c) determining to which of the beads an amplicon has bound on the basis of the intensity of the first detectable label and, where amplicons are bound to multiple subsets of beads, distinguishing between the multiple subsets of beads on the basis of bead size; wherein binding of an amplicon to a particular subset of beads is indicative of the presence of a particular respiratory pathogen in the sample.